Oxygen and Yeast Storage

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

TAK

Well-Known Member
Joined
Feb 5, 2012
Messages
1,094
Reaction score
210
Location
Lincoln
Oxygenation is only detrimental to beer flavor, but not to yeast health; right?

I.e., if I make some extra starter, which I often do, and keep the extra for storage, do I need to worry much about oxygen exposure to the stored portion while I'm packaging it? Obviously prolonged exposure to the air is a sanitation concern. That's not what I'm talking about. I mean activities such as, cold crashing the flask for several days with just a foil cover, pouring from said flask into a long-term storage container without CO2 protection, things if that sort.
 
Plenty of info from searching on storing yeast, storing yeast from starters, and storing yeast oxygen. The summary is harvesting from a starter is safe.
 
I've been over-building starters to save the excess for awhile and imo as long as you don't break sanitation the stored portion will be remarkably viable for months. Crashing is indeed going to draw air into the flask when the temp drops. But if there's any deleterious effect from that, it hasn't been evident.

Right now I'm resurrecting some 3787 from mid-November. It was just a WLP vial about half full of semi-washed slurry but the first step took off in just a few hours, and the second step is percolating along nicely as I write...

Cheers!
 
Back
Top